I've been looking for a spot to go for short weekends. When we wanna leave after school on a Friday and come back in time for dinner on the Sunday.

Our requirements are always: not too busy, dogs allowed, leafy and near water.

We live in Canberra and there's a few spots less than 2hrs drive from here that I was willing to check out. Then my friend came up with a couple of spots IN the ACT that fit all our criteria. I would've never even thought of looking! The ACT is so tiny that I just went straight to the NSW map.

There's 1 spot in particular that's right near where we went to a music festival the previous 2 years. It takes less than an hour from home to drive there! It's a really nice area. Hills and bushland. And this particular spot even has flush toilets and showers. That will be a first for me as far as camping in Oz goes!

I can check via work if it gets busy there and if it looks ok we'll go check it out in November.

There are quire a few camping spots in the ACT, I found them by googling one day for camping and as my son lives in Quenbeyan he has checked them out and says they are all pretty good and they all allow dogs as that is one criteria that we have. I find it quite surprising sometimes when looking for camping spots to find out how close some of them can be and and added bonus of being free or not very expensive. We are looking at Kowen Homestead at Sutton in the next few months.

Thanks for the heads up on the camping sites. I guess my biggest worry with it being so close to Canberra would be that it gets too busy. Or that it turns out to be a gathering place for bogans with revved up cars, boom boxes and feral dogs!

I have the dog requirement too. Which makes it extra important to have some water nearby when the weather starts getting warmer.

We considered Kowen Homesteady too for November. But I don't think there's a stream there. Am interested to hear what you think of it though.